I’ve always found these cycle barriers outside Morrisons to be terrible. In the past few years I’ve purchased a Larry Vs Harry Bullitt Cargo bike – many of you will have seen me with it when we’ve been running Dr Bike and other activities, such as the Climate Change meetings we had at All Saints Church.
As you can imagine this sort of bike, especially in this country, isn’t the most common in its shape and size. It’s pretty clear that a lot of local planners don’t even consider such bikes when implementing cycling infrastructure. Which brings us back to the back to the barriers in question.
As you may have guessed, I can’t get past these barriers with my bike. There’s a pavement to the right of this bonafide National Cycle Route, but it’s a narrow footpath. Cycling along it is technically illegal. I’m a confident cyclist, I don’t mind taking a detour on the road. What about some with a handcycle though? They can’t dismount, they may not wish to follow busier routes. If nothing else, what was the original planner thinking when this barrier was installed? You might argue “but what about mopeds?”. Yes, while mopeds are of course a concern, we don’t want them cutting through here…surely that’s a job for our police isn’t it? Do we put physicial barriers where we don’t want cars to park? No, often not, just some red or yellow paint.
Anyway, I’ve become aware of the people in the know regarding this sort of thing in the UK on twitter in the past couple of years, specifically Wheels for Wellbeing and Heavy Metal Handcyclist. I recently saw a tweet mentioning some action documenting similar barriers elsewhere in the country. It turns out barriers such as these are actually illegal as they don’t permit disabled cyclists to get past them. Credit to HeavyMetalHandcyclist, I asked them how to get the ball rolling on getting our barriers removed so cyclists of all shapes and sizes can navigate this section of the national cycle route, and they directed me to some templates I could use for a freedom of information request to send to Central Bedfordshire Council. I’ve edited it for our needs, and here‘s the text which I’m about to send.
So, I shall post this blog post, and then send the email. Fingers crossed we can get these barriers removed and continue to improve our local cycling infrastructure.
Happy Riding, Tom ?